The Oklahoma City Thunder beat the San Antonio Spurs in the playoffs once before. In the 2012 Western Conference Finals, Oklahoma City dropped the first two games before storming back and winning four in a row. They overwhelmed the Spurs with speed, athleticism, and physicality. Russell Westbrook was ferocious. Kevin Durant and James Harden shot the lights out. Serge Ibaka was a destructive force around the basket. It literally looked like the Thunder just flexed and sent the Spurs bouncing out of the playoffs.
That Spurs team was special too. It was a lockout year, with all the weirdness that implies, but San Antonio had a win percentage of .758 that season, second-best of the Tim Duncan era to that point. Duncan was still mostly Duncan, Kawhi Leonard was a rookie, Danny Green was still unfurling, Tony Parker was on the right side of 30, and five different rotation players made better than 40 percent of their threes. And yet, when the Thunder turned things up to 11, the Spurs were helpless.
Since Duncan arrived, the Spurs have a postseason winning percentage of .617 and five championships. They have also lost 98 playoff games and 14 playoff series. Such is the nature of competitive balance, even when you’re competing for a championship every season, you still lose far more often than you win.
The arc of my own NBA obsession tracks pretty closely with that of the Duncan Spurs (with the addition of a few preceding years to get acclimated and develop a learned distaste for the New York Knicks). I am pretty sure I have watched all 14 of San Antonio’s penultimate playoff losses. I have seen these same Spurs’ faces, staring at the floor, at their hands. I have watched as they finally allowed the exhaustion of a full season of NBA basketball and then some to rush in. As they let go of well-laid plans and contemplated the weight of beginning the process again.
Redemption is neither created or destroyed. Any team or player who acquires it simply foists the enormous hole it leaves behind onto someone else. The nature of these narrative arcs, as they overlap, swallow, and scaffold each other is fascinating. It can be heartbreaking as well, the way zooming in or out can change the picture dramatically, the way one team’s entire season can serve as fodder for the exploits of someone else.
Since the Spurs were steamrolled by the Thunder in 2012, both organizations have lived several basketball lifetimes.
The Spurs have lost a championship and won another, had their hearts broken by Chris Paul, landed a whopper of a free agent, watched one of their young talents blossom into an MVP-caliber player, and had one of the greatest regular seasons in history. In their mini-struggle with the Thunder, they already had their chance to drink from the chalice of redemption, beating Oklahoma City in 2014 on their way to the ultimate prize of a revenge title over the Miami Heat.
The Thunder have wandered in the desert. They traded James Harden for what turned out to be a handful of sand and some not-so-magic beans. A near-catastrophic injury to Russell Westbrook derailed a playoff run. A series of nagging injuries to Serge Ibaka derailed another. Finally, injuries to Kevin Durant kept them out of the playoffs altogether. Their physical and psychological wounds have taken a toll. They adhere to the same fundamental values but they have gotten a little older, a little tougher, a little angrier.
As it turns out, we were actually watching the Thunder’s story this whole time. They are the heroes, pristine or not. Everything the Spurs have accomplished the past four seasons was prelude, background, and foreshadowing, one big set-up for the arc of the Thunder to knock down.
These Thunder have suffered. They have lost, hard, died a thousand tiny deaths. They have had their flaws exaggerated, explored, obsessed over. Deserve’s got nothing to do with it but, should such a thing actually matter in the universe, we could probably come to grips with the truth that the Thunder deserved this playoff win. They didn’t really adapt or evolve, they got better at the things they do well, pushed through their flaws and rode intensity over the finish line. It’s worth celebrating that they won without compromising their essential Thunder-ness, and it’s fitting that they did it against the San Antonio Spurs. In that 2012 playoff series, San Antonio took the loss but also took the next four seasons of glory that was supposed to belong to Oklahoma City. There is some universal balance to the Thunder taking it back and in much the same way they beat the Spurs that first time around.
Balance is not inherently satisfying though. The Thunder’s redemption marks what could be the bittersweet end for Duncan and Manu Ginobili. It leaves another scar on the basketball psyches of Kawhi Leonard and LaMarcus Aldridge — a scar that will ache like crazy when next spring comes, the humidity changes, and the playoffs begin again.
The Thunder get to move on to the Conference Finals and take their best shot at the monolithic greatness of the Golden State Warriors, a matchup that itself carries all sorts of emotional baggage. Maybe this will be the last chapter in Oklahoma City’s story, perhaps they will be revealed to be just supporting characters, part of the scenery for Golden State’s epic journey. Or it could be that we’re trapped in a digression from the redemptive tale of LeBron James finally winning one for The Land. But it’s also possible that this really is Oklahoma City’s time, that the last four seasons were not just life and basketball wandering in concentric circles.
Westbrook will be Westbrook, Durant will be Durant and the Oklahoma City Thunder will be exactly what they’re supposed to be.